The Rudolf Steiner Archive

Fifth Lecture

[ 1 ] That Jesus, son of Pandira—Jeshu ben Pandira—has nothing to do, whether by kinship or otherwise, with the person or individual of whom we speak as the Jesus of the Gospel of Matthew, or the Jesus of the Gospel of Luke, or of any other Gospel; that this Jeshu ben Pandira was stoned a century before our era, that is, before the Christ event took place—and who was subsequently stoned and hung on a tree—must not be confused with all that we refer to when we speak of the Gospels; this must be strictly maintained. I would just like to point out explicitly: To point to the personality of Jeshu ben Pandira, to say something about the fact that he existed—this does not require, at first, any occult knowledge or any clairvoyant ability, but rather one can piece this together, if one wishes, from the Hebrew and Talmudic documents. The confusion with the actual Jesus has, after all, always occurred at various times, and it first took place as early as the 2nd century A.D. So while we have expressly emphasized that this Jesus, son of Pandira, has nothing to do in this regard with the Jesus of the Gospels, we must nevertheless acknowledge a historical connection between these two figures—one that can now, however, only be established through Spiritual Science research. However, we will only be able to grasp the full depth of this connection if we briefly revisit the topic of human evolution and its leaders.

[ 2 ] When we look up to those beings, those individualities who are the great guides of human evolution, we ultimately arrive at a series of exalted individualities who are often referred to—because, so to speak, the theory concerning these individualities has been most thoroughly established in the East—as the Bodhisattvas. There are quite a number of such Bodhisattvas. Their task is to be great teachers of humanity, allowing that which, according to the spiritual worlds and in accordance with human maturity for a given epoch, is meant to flow into humanity—from the spiritual worlds through the mystery schools—from one epoch to the next. And one can say: These Bodhisattvas take turns in successive ages; one of the Bodhisattvas always acts as the successor to the other. For our own time, we are primarily interested in those two Bodhisattvas whom we have often had to mention when speaking of the evolution of humanity: the Bodhisattva who, as the son of King Suddhodana, became the Buddha, and the one who succeeded him in the office of Bodhisattva—and who, since the office of Bodhisattva lasts so long, still holds that office today and—in accordance with Eastern wisdom and clairvoyant research, it may be said—will continue to do so for the next two thousand five hundred years. Then this Bodhisattva will undergo the same ascent that his predecessor underwent when he was elevated to the status of Buddha. The Bodhisattva currently in office will then be elevated to the status of Maitreya Buddha.

[ 3 ] In the guidance of human evolution—which we refer to as guidance by teachers—we have the Bodhisattvas who succeed one another in turn. And we must understand this succession of Bodhisattvas as the great teachers of human evolution and must not confuse them with the source of this teaching, from which the Bodhisattvas in turn receive what they are to impart to human evolution as successive teachings. We must create, as it were, a mental image of a college of Bodhisattvas, and at the center of this college we must conceive of the living source of the Bodhisattvas’ teachings. And this living source is none other than the one we, in our common parlance, designate by the term “Christ.” Thus, it is from Christ that all Bodhisattvas receive what they are to give to humanity in the course of the evolution of time.

[ 4 ] Now, a Bodhisattva should devote himself primarily to the Teaching as long as he remains a Bodhisattva; for we have seen that once a Bodhisattva is elevated to Buddhahood, he does not descend again to be incarnated in a physical body. Again, in accordance with all Eastern philosophy, it can be said that the Gautama Buddha—who, as the son of King Suddhodana, underwent his final incarnation in a physical body at that time—has since then experienced only incarnations that extend down to the etheric body. And in the lectures on the Gospel of Luke, we emphasized what the next task of this Bodhisattva—who had become the Buddha—was. We have seen: When the Jesus of the Gospel of Luke was born—the so-called Nathanic Jesus, who is a different figure from the Jesus of the Gospel of Matthew—the Buddha’s being, which at that time was incarnated down to the etheric body, so to speak, entered into the astral body of this Nathanic Jesus, whom the Gospel of Luke first describes to us. Therefore, one can say: From the time of his incarnation as Gautama Buddha, this being was no longer there to teach, but from then on, this Buddha was present as a living force. He had become a real force that works from the spiritual world into our physical world. It is something entirely different to work through teaching and to work through living force, through the force of growth. Until the moment a Bodhisattva becomes a Buddha, he is a teacher; from that moment on, he is a living force that intervenes in an organizing, life-giving way in whatever context. Thus the Buddha intervened in the life of the Nathanic Jesus, as Luke describes, and thus he behaved in accordance with his new dignity.

[ 5 ] From the 6th century B.C.E. to the present day, that Bodhisattva—who became the Buddha at that time—has been succeeded in the line of great teachers by his successor, the one who will later become the Maitreya Buddha. Therefore, we must seek the teaching that humanity has needed since the time when Gautama Buddha, the son of King Suddhodana, was active, in those places where that Bodhisattva—who is his successor—exerts his inspiration, where he, so to speak, instills in his disciples and students that which they are to share with the world. - I already pointed out yesterday how everything that was united, for example, in the “communities of therapists and Essenes” was destined to serve as an instrument for this Bodhisattva, and that Jesus, son of Pandira, was among the most significant, the most exalted, and the purest personalities within the Essene communities. Thus we must, as it were, see the teachings of that Bodhisattva shining into humanity on Earth through the Essenes.

[ 6 ] The actual Essene communities—as you can see from their external history—disappeared relatively soon after the Christ event had taken place on Earth, in terms of their deeper teachings. Therefore, it will not seem all that incredible when I say that, in essence, the communities of the Therapists and Essenes were essentially established to channel down from the spiritual realms—from the spheres of the Bodhisattvas—whatever was needed to comprehend the great and significant event of the Christ-appearance. The most important teachings that came to humanity to help it understand the Christ Event originated in the communities of the Therapeuts and the Essenes. Thus, in a sense, Jesus, the son of Pandira, was destined to be inspired by the Bodhisattva—who would become the Maitreya Buddha and who was working within the Essene communities—to formulate teachings that could make the Mystery of Palestine, the Mystery of Christ, understandable. More detailed information about the Therapists and Essenes, however, can only be uncovered through research in the field of Spiritual Science. External history knows very little about them. And we shall, so to speak, without hesitation—since we are in an anthroposophical circle that understands how to accept such things—draw from the mysteries of the “Therapeuts and Essenes” what is necessary to arrive at a deeper understanding of the Gospel of Matthew and also of the other Gospels. And we wish to describe these mysteries in the way that a scholar of Spiritual Science must conceive of the Therapists and Essenes.

[ 7 ] The essential point regarding these communities—which flourished a century before the Christ event in order to prepare for it through teaching—was the manner in which initiation was performed among those who were members of the Therapeuts and the Essenes. They underwent an initiation designed specifically to evoke an understanding—an understanding through clairvoyant insight—of the significance of Hebraism and Abrahamism for the Christ event. This was, in fact, a mystery of the Therapeutae and Essene communities. Their adherents were initiated precisely to gain a clearer, clairvoyant insight into the connection described here. Such an Essene was thus first to learn to grasp the full significance of what Abraham had accomplished for the Hebrew people, so that he might appreciate that Abraham can truly be regarded as a kind of progenitor of the Hebrew people. That the predisposition I have spoken to you about in the last few hours was laid within him—that predisposition which then, as it were, had to be filtered through many generations and flow down through the blood—this is what an Essene was to understand through his own insight.

[ 8 ] To understand how something important for the entire evolution of humanity can come about through a personality such as Abraham, you must take a very close look at one sentence, one important truth: that whenever a personality is chosen to be a special instrument for the evolution of humanity, the direct intervention of a divine-spiritual being is necessary in the case of such a personality.

[ 9 ] Those of you who attended the Munich performance of The Rosicrucian Mystery or have read it will know that one of the most important dramatic plot twists is based on the following: The Hierophant points out to Maria that she can fulfill her mission only if such an influence from a higher being has indeed taken place; and this actually brings about in her what might be called a separation of the higher members from the lower, so that the latter can then be possessed by a subordinate spirit. - Everything found in The Rosicrucian Mystery, if you allow it to take effect upon your soul and do not accept it lightly, can draw your attention to great mysteries of human evolution. Since Abraham was destined to play such an important role in human evolution, it was necessary for him that what humanity had previously perceived in the Atlantean era—namely, the Spirit that interweaves and permeates the outer world—should penetrate into the innermost core of his being. This happened for the first time with Abraham, and thus, for the first time, it became possible for a transformation of spiritual perception to take place. However, for this to happen, the influence of a divine-spiritual being was necessary. A divine-spiritual being, as it were, planted within Abraham’s constitution the seed for all the constitutions that were to descend from him through the generations.

[ 10 ] So an Essene of that time asked himself: What was it, exactly, that shaped the Hebrew people, enabling them to become the bearers of the Christ mission? was first brought about in its nascent form by that mysterious being whom one can find only by tracing the entire lineage back to Abraham, where it, as it were, slipped into the inner being of Abraham, only to then work through the blood as a kind of national spirit within the Hebrew people. So if one wishes to understand this, so to speak, ultimate mystery of human evolution, one must ascend to this spirit that implanted that predisposition and seek it out there, where it had not yet slipped into the inner organization of Abraham. That is why the Essene said: If a person wishes to ascend to this truly inspiring or inaugurating spirit of the Hebrew people and recognize it in its purity, they must, as an Essene or therapist, undergo a certain process of development through which they purify themselves of everything that has come to the human soul from the physical world since the event of Abraham. For the Essene told himself: The spiritual being that a person carries within, and all the spiritual entities that contribute to the becoming of humanity, can be seen in their purity only in the spiritual world; as they dwell within us, they are defiled by the forces of the physical-sensory world.

[ 11 ] Now, according to the Essenes’ view—and this is, of course, absolutely correct within a certain realm of knowledge—every person living at that time carried within themselves all the impurities that had entered the human soul in previous ages, impurities that clouded the clear vision of the spiritual being who had laid that characteristic predisposition within Abraham. Consequently, every Essene soul had to purify itself of what had entered that predisposition and what, so to speak, clouded the view of that being dwelling in the blood of these generations; only then could it be truly perceived. All spiritual purifications, all of the Essene’s spiritual exercises, were designed to free the soul from the influences and inherited traits passed down through the generations, which could obscure the view of the spiritual being that had inspired Abraham; for human beings do not merely possess their innermost spiritual and soul-like essence within themselves, but they have clouded and defiled it through inherited characteristics.

[ 12 ] Now, there is a law of the Spiritual Sciences that the Essenes were able to fulfill primarily through their research and clairvoyant insight: that the influence of heredity only truly ceases when one ascends through forty-two generations in the ancestral line. Only then, after ascending these forty-two generations, has one cast everything out of one’s soul. That is to say, one inherits something from one’s father and mother, something from one’s grandfather and grandmother, and so on. However, the further one ascends the ancestral line, the less one carries within oneself of the impurities of the inner being that have arisen through heredity, and one has nothing left once one has ascended through forty-two generations. That is where the influence of heredity ceases. Therefore, the Essene purification rites were designed to work out of one’s inner being—through inner spiritual exercises and careful training—all the impurities that had entered the soul over the course of forty-two generations. That is why every Essene had to undergo rigorous inner spiritual exercises and arduous mystical paths; which led him through forty-two stages toward the purification of his soul. In fact, there were forty-two precisely definable stages that he had to undergo within himself; only then did he know himself to be free from all influences of the sensory world, from everything that had arisen through heredity as a defilement of his inner being.

[ 13 ] Thus the Essene ascended forty-two steps until he felt his innermost being, the central core of his essence, to be akin to the Divine-Spiritual. That is why he said to himself: “I am ascending to the God who matters to me by passing through these forty-two steps.” The Essene had a clear understanding of how to ascend to a divine being not yet immersed in matter. He knew the path upward. He knew this from his own experience. Among all those who lived on Earth at that time, the Therapeuts and Essenes were the only ones who knew the truth regarding an event such as the Abraham event. They knew this insofar as it pertains to inheritance through the generations. They knew: If one wishes to ascend to a being that has entered the line of inheritance, and if one wishes to arrive at the point where it has not yet plunged into matter, then one must ascend through forty-two steps, which correspond to the forty-two generations; then one will find it. But the Essenes knew something else as well. They knew: Just as a human being must ascend through forty-two stages—which correspond to the forty-two generations—to reach this divine being, so too must this divine being, if it wishes to descend into human blood, descend through forty-two stages; it must, therefore, take the reverse path. Just as a human being needs forty-two steps to ascend to God, so God needs forty-two steps to descend, to become a human being among human beings.

[ 14 ] This is what the Essenes taught. And above all, among the Essenes, Jeshu ben Pandira taught under the influence of the Bodhisattva who inspired him. Therefore, it was an Essene teaching that the being who had inspired Abraham to incorporate the divine seed into his own being took forty-two generations to descend to full humanity.

[ 15 ] Now that we know this, we also know the source from which the writer of the Gospel of Matthew drew the insight that led him to seek out precisely these forty-two generations. And it was Jesus, the son of Pandira, who drew the Essenes’ attention to one thing above all else. He lived in a century before it was possible for the forty-two generations to exist; for they were only possible a century later. He pointed out to the Essenes that they could only travel the path through the forty-two stages to a certain extent—up to the point where they could connect with historical events—and that from there onward they could continue only through grace from above; but that the time would come when this would be a natural occurrence, when a human being would be born who would possess within himself the ability to to ascend so far through his own blood that the divine power he needs may descend to him, enabling him to bring the entire spirit of the Hebrew people—the Spirit of Yahweh—into manifestation within the blood of the Hebrew people. Therefore, Jeshu ben Pandira taught: If Zarathustra, the Bringer of Ahura Mazdao, is to incarnate in a human body, this is possible only if that human body has been prepared in such a way that the divine-spiritual being filling it has descended through forty-two generations.

[ 16 ] We have thus pointed out how the source of the doctrine of generations—with which the Gospel of Matthew begins—originated in the Essene communities. If we wish to fully understand these facts, however, we must point to something even deeper underlying the whole matter.

[ 17 ] Everything related to human evolution and human development approaches us, so to speak, from two sides—simply because human beings are dual beings. When we encounter a human being in their waking consciousness, the four aspects of their being are interconnected, and we cannot immediately discern how they are a dual nature. But at night, when we have the entire human being before us, we clearly see this human being divided into two parts: that which remains in the physical world as the physical body and the etheric body, and that which emerges from the physical body and the etheric body as the astral body and the “I.” The human being is, as it were, composed of these two parts. As long as we speak of what makes the human being belong to the physical world, we can really only speak of the physical body and the etheric body. Everything that constitutes human activities and affairs in the physical world concerns only the physical and etheric bodies, even though the other members are involved during waking hours. During waking hours, the human being acts from the “I” and the astral body into the other two members; during sleep, he leaves them to their own devices. In truth, however, the moment a person falls asleep, forces and beings begin to act from outer space, from the cosmos, and to permeate what the person has left behind, so that we are in fact dealing with a continuous influence from the cosmos on the human physical body and etheric body. But what remains of us in bed, and what constitutes the outer aspect of our being—namely, the physical body and the etheric body—is actually determined within forty-two generations; it is inherited there. So if we begin with the first generation and take everything that belongs to the physical being there, and continue through forty-two generations, we find that after forty-two generations there is nothing left of what were the most essential predispositions in the first member. Thus, within six times seven generations, what actually constitutes the essence and power of a human being’s physical and etheric bodies before us is determined. Everything we can find in these two bodies in the way of inherited characteristics, we must seek among the ancestors, but only within the course of forty-two generations. If we go further back, we find nothing of it; everything belonging to an earlier generation has disappeared. Thus, when we consider the outer aspect of a human being, we find the force permeating it bound to forty-two generations.

[ 18 ] Human development over time is thus based on a numerical ratio. Let us examine this numerical ratio more closely; it is important that we take it into account. Let us consider it as it actually needs to be considered if we are to understand the genealogy in the Gospel of Matthew.

[ 19 ] Everything pertaining to the physical body is bound to forty-two generations, for the reason that everything bound to temporal development—that is, everything pertaining to time—is bound to the number seven. Therefore, the development beyond the physically inherited characteristics among the Essenes was also bound to the number seven. An Essene would say to himself: You must pass through six times seven, which is forty-two stages; then you ascend to the next seven stages, which thus constitute the completion of the number seven—that is, seven times seven equals forty-nine stages. However, what lies beyond the forty-two steps can no longer be counted among the forces and beings that are active in the physical and etheric bodies. Although the entire evolution of the physical and etheric bodies is truly completed only according to the law of the number seven—after seven times seven generations—a complete transformation has already been achieved in the last seven generations; nothing of the first generations remains there. What is therefore relevant to us must be sought within six times seven. But when the number seven is fulfilled, we are faced with something that must already be recognized as something new. In that realm one enters after the forty-two generations, one is no longer dealing with a human existence, but with a superhuman one. We thus distinguish between six times seven generations, which are thoroughly rooted in the earth, and what lies beyond that—the seven times seven—which already leads beyond the earth; this is the fruit for the spiritual world. After the six times seven, the fruit blossoms, and it then emerges for the spiritual world at the seven times seven.

[ 20 ] That is why those from whom the Gospel of Matthew originated said, as it were: The physical body that Zarathustra made use of had to be so mature that, after forty-two generations, it was already at the beginning of spiritualization, of deification—already at the beginning of that stage where it was bound to succumb to deification. - Thus, it already falls within the beginning of the forty-third generation, but does not enter it; instead, it now allows itself to be permeated by another being—that being which, as the spirit of Zarathustra, incarnates on Earth as Jesus of Nazareth. Thus, through the fulfillment of the mystery of the numbers, everything had come to pass that could provide the soul of Zarathustra, in Jesus of Nazareth, with the most fitting body and the most fitting blood. Everything pertaining to the physical body and the etheric body had thereby been prepared for the evolution of humanity.

[ 21 ] Now, however, a human being—and thus also the one who was to become the vessel for the Christ-essence—possesses not only a physical body and an etheric body, but also an astral body and an “I.” Therefore, it was not enough to do everything necessary for the proper preparation of the physical body and the etheric body; everything also had to be done for the proper preparation of the astral body and the “I.” For such a momentous event, this could not initially be accomplished in a single personality, but had to be accomplished in two personalities. The physical body and the etheric body were prepared in the individual first described in the Gospel of Matthew. And the astral body and the “I” were prepared in the individual whom we know from the Gospel of Luke as the Nathanic Jesus. For the early years, this was a different individual. While the Jesus of the Gospel of Matthew received the corresponding physical and etheric bodies, the Jesus of the Gospel of Luke was to receive the corresponding astral body and the corresponding I-bearer. How could the latter have come about?

[ 22 ] We saw that the forces of the forty-two generations had to be prepared in a very specific way so that the members necessary for the Jesus of the Gospel of Matthew could come into being. But the astral body and the I also had to be prepared so that they could later come together in the appropriate manner. We will speak later about how they were able to come together. — Thus, corresponding preparations also had to be made for the Jesus of the Gospel of Luke. Let us consider, in this connection, the nature of the state of sleep. It is a myth, I said, stemming from the information provided by lower clairvoyance, that the entire astral and I-being of the human being is contained within the cloud of mist that hovers near the physical body and the etheric body of the sleeping person. For it is indeed the case that when a human being, in the state of sleep, steps out of the physical body and the etheric body, is in truth poured out, expanded into the entire cosmos—into that which belongs to our cosmos. This, after all, is the mystery of our sleep: that we draw from the world of the stars—which is why we speak of the astral body that is poured out over the world of the stars—the purest forces from the entire cosmos, which we then bring with us upon waking, when we must once again submerge ourselves into the physical and etheric bodies. Then we emerge from sleep, strengthened and invigorated by everything we can absorb from the entire cosmos.

[ 23 ] If a person today—as was also the case in the time of Jesus Christ—becomes clairvoyant in the higher sense, what must then happen to him? In today’s normal state, a person loses consciousness when he emerges from his physical body and etheric body with his astral body and his “I.” However, clairvoyant consciousness must be enabled to see—with the physical and etheric bodies set aside—using only the instruments of the astral body and the “I.” Then clairvoyant consciousness becomes a participant in the world of the stars and perceives what is within it; it does not merely look into it, but ascends into the world of the stars. Just as the Essene consciousness ascends through the sequence of time, which is based on the number seven, so must the human being pass through the stages that enable him to perceive the cosmos clairvoyantly.

[ 24 ] I have already hinted on several occasions at where the dangers lie, both for development in one direction and for development in the other. Essentially, for the Essenes, it was a descent into the physical body and the etheric body in order to find God through the passage of the forty-two generations. It was as if a person who wakes up does not see the world around them, but instead plunges into the physical body and the etheric body to observe their forces—that is, to perceive their outer self from within. When waking up, a person does not consciously descend into the physical and etheric bodies. They are spared from doing so because, at the moment of waking, their consciousness is directed toward their surroundings rather than toward the forces of the physical and etheric bodies. This was the essential point with the Essenes: that they learned to perceive all the forces stemming from the forty-two generations; that they learned to look beyond what the gaze finds in the outer world and to immerse themselves in their own physical and etheric bodies, where they saw what lived in the sense of the mystery of six times seven, of forty-two generations.

[ 25 ] In a similar way, a person must elevate themselves if they wish to ascend into the cosmos, if they wish to discover the mysteries that underlie the entire cosmos. This is more powerful. When a person descends into his own inner being, he is exposed only to the danger of being overcome by all the forces within himself—by desires, passions, and everything that lies at the bottom of the soul—things to which a person usually pays no attention and of which he has no inkling at all, for he is generally prevented by his external upbringing from becoming acquainted with these forces. They have no opportunity at all to be overtaken by them, for their attention is immediately diverted by the emergence of the external world upon waking. So while there is a danger in descending into one’s own inner self—that one will, so to speak, be seized by the basest instincts and most selfish forces of one’s own nature—there is another danger when one experiences spreading out across the entire cosmos. And this danger cannot be characterized more precisely than by saying: For anyone who experiences this moment—in which they do not fall asleep into unconsciousness, but rather fall asleep so consciously that they have, in their astral body and their “I,” an instrument for perceiving the spiritual world—the danger that overtakes them is something like a tremendous glare, as if a person were facing the sun’s rays. They are dazzled by the immense magnitude and, above all, by the overwhelming confusion of impressions.

[ 26 ] Just as the stages that human beings had to undergo in an Essene-like manner in order to learn to recognize everything that was of inherited characteristics in the physical and etheric bodies are to be designated by the numerical mystery of six times seven, so there is also a numerical mystery that represents how human beings come to know the cosmic mysteries, the mysteries of the greater world. The best way to approach this mystery is by making use of what exists of its own accord out there in the cosmos—in the movements and constellations, in the forms of expression found in the stars—what is, as it were, inscribed in the stars. - Just as one advances through six times seven stages to the mysteries of the human inner being, so too does one ascend through twelve times seven—that is, eighty-four stages—to the spiritual mysteries of the cosmos. Once one has passed through these twelve times seven—that is, eighty-four—steps, one reaches the point where the labyrinth of these spiritual world forces is no longer dazzling, where the human being has truly attained the calm to find one’s way through this vast labyrinth, where this labyrinth is fully understood. This, too, was taught in a certain sense by the Essenes.

[ 27 ] When a person becomes clairvoyant in the sense described here, they pour themselves out as they fall asleep into something that is expressed in the numerical mystery of twelve times seven. But with what the twelve times seven represents, they are already within the spiritual realm: for when they have completed the eleven times seven, they have already reached the boundary of the mysteries. Just as the seven times seven is already within the spiritual realm, so too is the twelve times seven already within the spiritual realm. If a person wishes to traverse this path, he needs eleven times seven steps to arrive in the spiritual realm—that is, the person must pass through eleven times seven steps in the astral body and the “I.” This is expressed in the language of the stars by taking the number seven from the seven planets and deriving what one must undergo in outer space from the twelve constellations of the zodiac. Just as the seven planets are constellated within the twelve constellations and the constellations encompass them, so must the human being, when immersing themselves in the cosmos, pass through seven times twelve—or seven times eleven—stages until they arrive in the spiritual realm.

[ 28 ] So, if you want to get a sense of this, you can imagine the sphere of the spiritual encompassing the twelve constellations of the zodiac, with the human being at the very center of it. Now, the spiritual realm is so vast that, if the human being wishes to reach it, he cannot simply begin to radiate outward from the center; rather, he must expand in a spiral, turning, as it were, through seven spiral turns, and each time he completes a spiral turn, he passes through all twelve constellations, so that he must pass through seven times twelve points. Human beings gradually expand spirally into the cosmos—all of this is, of course, merely a symbol of what human beings experience—and if, circling in this way, they were to pass through the twelve constellations for the seventh time, they would have reached the Divine-Spiritual. It is then the case that, instead of looking out into the cosmos from his center, man looks in from the spiritual circumference, from the twelve points, and can observe what is in the outer world. One must go through this process if one wishes to see what is in the world. It is not enough to adopt a single point of view; one must adopt twelve points of view. Anyone who wished to ascend to the Divine-Spiritual had to pass through eleven times seven stages, had to lead the astral body and the “I” upward through eleven times seven stages. When he reached the twelve times seven, he was within the Spiritual.

[ 29 ] In this way, the astral body and the “I” had to pass through twelve times seven and eleven times seven stages, respectively, if they were to reach the Divine. If the Divine wishes to descend and prepare a human “I,” it must likewise descend through eleven times seven stages.

[ 30 ] If, then, the Gospel of Luke intends to describe those spiritual forces that made the astral body and the “I” fit to be the “bearer of Christ,” it had to describe how the divine-spiritual force descends through eleven times seven stages. This is indeed what the Gospel of Luke describes to us. Because the Gospel of Luke describes to us that other personality for whom the astral body and the “I” were prepared, it does not describe, as the Gospel of Matthew does, six times seven generations, but rather eleven times seven successive stages through which—as is explicitly stated in the Gospel of Luke— — what dwelt in the individuality of the Jesus of the Gospel of Luke. If you count the human stages announced in the Gospel of Luke through which the divine power is channeled, you will arrive at seventy-seven stages (Luke 3:23–38).

[ 31 ] Because the Gospel of Matthew describes to us the mystery of the power at work in the descent of that divine force which shapes the physical body and the etheric body, the number six times seven must prevail in it. And in the Gospel of Luke—because it describes the descent of the divine power that transforms the astral body and the I—the number eleven times seven must appear. From this we can see from what depths these things are drawn; indeed, the mysteries of initiation—the sequence of stages in the descent of the divine-spiritual into a human individuality and in its outward expansion into the cosmos—are set forth in the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke.

[ 32 ] Why a genealogy also came into being in the Gospel of Luke, and why—at a time when only a few people had been taught the mystery of Christ Jesus—it was revealed that there are seventy-seven generations from God and Adam down to the Jesus of the Gospel of Luke—we will discuss this further tomorrow.